It is said that in China people mostly live by rivers. Long before expressways carved through mountains and airplanes stitched cities together across impossible distances, rivers were the veins through which life flowed. As more and more people clustered along these liquid highways, villages sprouted like wild mushrooms after rain, towns stretched their limbs, and cities unfurled their stone and timber tapestries along the banks.

       No one knows exactly when the town first took shape, but everyone agrees it began at the wharf. The wharf was both gateway and farewell point—people arrived with dreams bundled in cloth and departed with memories weighing in their hearts. Over decades, families spread outward like ripples, populating the hills and valleys that rolled away from the water’s edge.

       The river drew people to its banks with promises of sustenance and carried them away when their time came. Some said the river had a hunger all its own.

       In summer, the air hung thick and heavy, pressing down on our shoulders like an invisible hand. The cicadas buzzed relentlessly, their chorus rising to a fevered pitch in the afternoon heat before fading as twilight painted the sky in watercolor strokes of purple and orange. During those sweltering months, the river swelled with the upstream rains, its current quickening like a heartbeat.

       Xiaoyan was perhaps the youngest the river had taken. My memories of her remain as clear as river stones polished smooth by the current: her hair in two perfect braids, her eyes wide with perpetual wonder, the small gap between her front teeth that whistled when she became too excited. Her laugh tinkled like the small brass bell that hung outside our kindergarten classroom.

       That summer, the flood arrived with clockwork precision, as if obeying some ancient schedule inscribed in the mountains upstream. Water spilled over the banks, transforming familiar paths into shallow streams. For most of us children, floods were routine—a yearly inconvenience that adults fretted over while we secretly delighted in the temporary chaos. But for Xiaoyan, the flood was a mysterious visitor, a phenomenon so novel that it sparkled with possibility.

       “Look at all the fish!” she exclaimed, her voice fluttering in the humid air as we stood at the river’s edge where the water lapped hungrily at unfamiliar territory.

       Tiny silver bodies darted through the shallow water near the bank—fish washed down from upstream ponds and rice paddies. They flashed like living coins in the sunlight, their movements quick and desperate. Xiaoyan crouched low, her cotton dress ballooning around her knees as she dipped her hands into the murky water.

       “They’re so fast!” she giggled as the fish slipped through her fingers like liquid silver. Her frustration bloomed into determination, her brow furrowed with concentration as she tried again and again to catch the elusive creatures.

       “I’m going to get a basin,” Xiaoyan’s friend announced, a boy whose name I can no longer recall, though his face remains clear—round cheeks perpetually flushed as though he had just run a great distance. “We can catch more that way.”

Xiaoyan nodded enthusiastically, water droplets scattering from her fingertips like tiny prisms catching the light. “Hurry back!” she called as he scampered off, his footsteps splashing through puddles.

       That was the last time anyone heard her voice.

The boy returned minutes later, plastic basin clutched triumphantly to his chest, but the spot where Xiaoyan had been kneeling was empty. Only her slippers remained, two small islands on the muddy bank, waiting faithfully for feet that would never return.

       The search began immediately. Adults waded into the shallows, calling her name with increasing urgency while we children stood in a huddled mass, suddenly aware of the river’s power in a way we had never been before. The sky darkened with approaching storm clouds, as if nature itself were in mourning.

       They found her body several miles downstream, caught in a tangle of branches that had collected along a bend in the river. Her cotton dress had bloomed around her like the petals of some strange aquatic flower. Her eyes were closed, her expression peaceful, as though she had merely fallen asleep in an unlikely place.

       The old women of the town nodded knowingly to one another. “She was originally a fish,” they whispered behind cupped hands. “And now she has returned to her true form.” As if this explanation could somehow soften the sharp edges of tragedy, make sense of the senseless.

       At her funeral, the sky opened up and rain fell in sheets, as though the heavens themselves were weeping. We kindergarteners stood in a solemn line, clutching white paper flowers in our small fists, too young to fully comprehend the permanence of death but old enough to feel its weight settling around us like a heavy cloak.

       That night, I dreamed of Xiaoyan swimming through clear waters, her hair floating around her like dark seaweed, her movements fluid and purposeful. In my dream, she was not afraid but transformed—half-girl, half-fish—her eyes reflecting the dappled light that filtered through the water’s surface. When I told my mother about the dream the next morning, she stroked my hair and said nothing, but I saw something flicker across her face—relief, perhaps, that it had not been me.

The memory of Xiaoyan faded with time, as childhood tragedies often do, submerged beneath the accumulation of days that followed. Life continued its steady flow, carrying us forward like leaves on the current.

       Summer followed summer, and we grew bolder in our relationship with the river. Once the initial shock of Xiaoyan’s death had dulled, the river once again became our playground, our respite from the suffocating heat. We learned to respect its power while still surrendering to its allure.

       When night fell and the day’s oppressive heat finally began to relent, we would make our way to the river’s edge. This was the best time—when the water reflected the first stars appearing in the deepening blue of twilight. We shed our clothes without ceremony and plunged into the cool embrace of the river, our bodies slick and strange in the gathering darkness.

Another friend of my childhood who had been taken by the river was Mingming, Aunt Wu’s only son. In our small community, Aunt Wu stood out like an exotic bird among sparrows—her beauty was the kind that made people pause in their conversations when she walked by. She had married a PLA soldier, a man whose handsomeness matched her beauty. Their wedding had been a town event, with seemingly everyone in attendance, drawn by the magnetic pull of two people whose physical perfection seemed to promise something extraordinary.

       And extraordinary their child was. Mingming emerged into the world already seeming wise beyond infancy, with eyes that tracked movement with unusual focus and a calm demeanor that visitors remarked upon with something close to reverence. He was not only beautiful but possessed a gravity that set him apart.

       Aunt Wu, so satisfied with her perfect son, readily agreed to sign the birth control plan and underwent the operation that would ensure Mingming remained her only child. She poured all her maternal energy into her son, teaching him Chinese characters when other children were still mastering their first words, reading to him for hours while we ran wild through the streets and fields.

       By age five, while we were still learning to tie our shoes, Mingming could recite classical poems and explain their meanings with the precision of a much older child. He moved through the world with a kind of careful deliberation, as though conserving energy for greater purposes. When adults asked what he wanted to be when he grew up—a question adults always seem compelled to ask children—he would answer without hesitation: “A scientist.” And such was the seriousness of his demeanor that no one doubted him.

       Despite his scholarly nature, Mingming was drawn to the river like the rest of us. While we splashed and shrieked in chaotic joy, he approached swimming as he did everything else—methodically, with quiet determination. We watched in awe as he taught himself proper swimming techniques from a book his mother had given him, practicing each movement with meticulous attention until he could swim one hundred meters without visible effort, his strokes even and precise, barely disturbing the water’s surface.

       It happened during the summer when Mingming had just turned six. The day had been particularly oppressive, the air so thick with humidity that breathing felt like drinking. When evening came, the usual relief was minimal—heat still radiated from the earth like an oven left open.

       A relative had come to visit—a cousin from the city who was a few years older than Mingming and regarded the small town with poorly concealed disdain. To impress his urban visitor, Mingming suggested swimming in the river, perhaps eager to demonstrate the one physical skill in which he excelled.

       When they arrived at the river, they discovered several wood rafts tied together near the bank—large, flat platforms used to transport goods downstream. The boys climbed aboard, their feet making hollow thumping sounds on the weathered planks.

       The cousin, seeking to establish dominance in this unfamiliar territory, began diving from the edge of the raft, creating impressive splashes that sent ripples across the surface of the river. Not to be outdone, Mingming joined him, their bodies arcing through the humid air before slicing into the water below.

       After several dives, the cousin declared himself bored. It was then that Mingming, perhaps feeling the need to retain his visitor’s respect, pointed to the stretch of rafts extending into the river. “I can swim from this end to that end underwater,” he declared, his voice containing none of the boastfulness such a statement would carry coming from another child. “Without taking a breath.”

       Before anyone could respond, he filled his lungs with air, his narrow chest expanding like a bellows, and slipped beneath the surface with barely a ripple to mark his passage.

       One minute passed. Then two. The cousin shifted uncomfortably, peering into the murky depths. After five minutes, panic erupted. The cousin ran to get help, his earlier coolness abandoned in the face of genuine emergency.

       By the time Aunt Wu arrived, a crowd had gathered at the riverbank. She fell to her knees in the mud, her beautiful face contorted into something ancient and primal as she begged the heavens and anyone who would listen to return her son. The crowd worked frantically to untie and move the rafts, which had been lashed together with complex knots.

       When they finally managed to move the last raft, Mingming was there, floating face-down, his slender arms spread wide as if embracing the water that had claimed him. It was later determined that he had become disoriented under the rafts, unable to find his way back to the surface in the shadowy confusion beneath the wooden platforms.

       The news of Mingming’s death ripped through the community like a physical force. Aunt Wu’s husband rushed back from his military post, arriving with the desperate energy of someone who believes speed might somehow reverse time, undo what had been done. Within days, his jet-black hair was streaked with gray, as though grief had physically marked him. It seemed impossible that someone in his thirties could age so visibly, so rapidly, but sorrow works its own peculiar alchemy on the human body.

       At the funeral, Aunt Wu stood like a statue, her face blank, her eyes focused on something none of us could see. People whispered that something vital had broken inside her, that she would never be the same. They were right. In the months that followed, she moved through the town like a ghost, her legendary beauty dimmed by grief, her steps hesitant as though she had forgotten how to navigate the physical world.

       I remember looking at Mingming in his small coffin, his face composed in death as it had been in life, and feeling a cold certainty settle in my chest: the river was hungry, and it did not discriminate between the ordinary and the extraordinary.

I felt really lucky that I was not taken away by the river, considering how much time I spent in it. But there had been close calls—moments when I felt the river’s grip tighten around me, testing my resolve to remain among the living.

       One sweltering afternoon, several of us were swimming near the old willow tree that dipped its trailing branches into the water like fingers testing the temperature. One by one, we challenged each other to swim across a narrow section of the river. When my turn came, I plunged in with more confidence than skill, my thin arms slapping at the water’s surface.

       Halfway across, something changed. The current seemed to strengthen without warning, and I suddenly felt choked, my rhythm disrupted. I tried to continue but found myself sinking, the river bottom dropping away beneath my searching toes. Panic surged through me, a wild tide of fear that paralyzed my limbs even as my mind screamed for movement.

       Water closed over my head, and the world became a blur of green-brown light and swirling silt. In desperation, I thrust my hand above the surface, fingers splayed in a silent plea for help. Through the roaring in my ears, I could hear muffled shouts from the shore.

       Just as darkness began to edge my vision, I felt a strong grip around my wrist. Someone was pulling me, dragging me through the water toward the shallows. When I broke the surface, I gasped like a newborn, air burning my lungs in the most welcome pain I had ever experienced.

       My rescuer had been Wang Daifu, an older boy from down the street who was known for his swimming prowess. He said nothing about saving me, simply nodded when I thanked him between racking coughs, water streaming from my nose and mouth.

       That night, I lay in bed trembling, feeling the phantom sensation of water filling my lungs. I didn’t swim for weeks afterward, watching from the shore as my friends frolicked in the currents that had nearly claimed me.

       But as children do, I eventually forgot the fear, or at least buried it beneath newer experiences. The river’s call was too powerful, the relief it offered from summer’s oppressive heat too tempting to resist forever.

       Another brush with the river’s hunger came later that summer. The school had closed for a holiday, and several classmates and I found ourselves drawn to the riverbank, as inevitable as iron filings to a magnet. I was still cautious around deep water, so when someone suggested swimming, I hung back.

       “It’s too dangerous,” I said, trying to disguise my fear as wisdom.

       Then I spotted a small boat moored nearby—a simple wooden craft used by local fishermen. “Let’s use that instead,” I suggested, pointing. The others agreed enthusiastically, and we clambered aboard one after another, the boat rocking precariously with each additional passenger.

       Xiao Jun, the smallest among us with skinny limbs that seemed too fragile for this world, was the last to attempt boarding. As each of us had jumped onto the boat, the gap between the bank and the vessel had widened incrementally. By the time Xiao Jun prepared to leap, the distance was significant—especially for someone with his limited reach.

       We should have brought the boat closer to shore for him, but in our childish excitement, none of us thought to do so. Xiao Jun backed up a few steps, his face set with determination, then launched himself toward the boat. His feet left the ground, his body suspended briefly in air, but it wasn’t enough. He fell short, dropping into the water with a splash.

       The water wasn’t deep there, but Xiao Jun didn’t know how to swim. After a moment of stunned silence, bubbles broke the surface, followed by his hands waving frantically, his head bobbing up just long enough to gasp before sinking again.

       Without thinking, I leaned over the side of the boat and stretched out my hand. Our fingers connected, and I pulled with a strength I didn’t know I possessed. Xiao Jun emerged from the water sputtering and coughing, his eyes wide with terror. Together with another boy, I hauled him over the side of the boat and onto the wooden planks, where he lay trembling, water streaming from his clothes and schoolbag.

       When he had recovered enough to speak, Xiao Jun looked at me with an intensity that made me uncomfortable. “You saved me,” he said simply, as if stating an obvious fact about the weather.

       I shrugged, unsure how to respond. It hadn’t felt like saving—just reaching, grabbing, pulling. The most natural thing in the world. Yet looking at his soaked form and remembering the panic in his eyes, I realized how quickly the river might have added him to its tally.

       Years passed, and the river remained the central artery of our childhood, the place where we sought relief from summer’s heat, where we learned about ourselves and each other, where we first confronted our own mortality through the losses of friends like Xiaoyan and Mingming.

       Sometimes at dusk, when the light turned golden and insects danced above the water’s surface, I would sit on the bank alone, watching the current flow endlessly eastward. In those quiet moments, it seemed as though the river was speaking—not in words, but in the eternal language of movement, of cycles, of things that remain the same even as they constantly change.

       The river had taken some of us, yet spared others. It had nearly claimed me twice, only to release me back to the world of air and light and solid ground. There was no rhyme or reason to its choices that I could discern—Xiaoyan with her bright curiosity, Mingming with his brilliant mind—why them and not others? Not me?

       I came to understand that the river was neither malevolent nor benevolent; it simply was. Like time itself, it flowed without regard for human desires or fears, carrying away what fell into its embrace, nurturing what grew along its banks. It gave life and took it with the same indifferent power.

       Xiaoyan and Mingming were not gone, not really. They had simply become part of the river’s eternal story, a story that included all of us who had ever stood upon its banks, peering into its depths, seeing our own reflections ripple and transform in the moving water.

       The river has taken them all, I would think as sleep claimed me. And someday, in one way or another, it will take the rest of us, too.